7. Oradea

Elda greetsus at the door, hovering like a mother hen. "This is Natalia. She'll be staying with us for the foreseeable future."

The motherly woman gives her a smile. "If you need anything at all, just ask. I'm more than happy to help," she says, although she looks slightly harried. "Overmaster Descallia and Lucianna just came down from a nap while you were out. I'm going to pop into the kitchen and make sure they have everything they need. The ladies have been helping me with preparations while you men have been out, but there's still so much to do."

My eyes narrow, suspecting she's working alone. "You should stop sending all the staff home and dealing with everything yourself. That's why we have them, Elda."

She smiles. "I know, but Elise's little one has the cough."

I gesture to the kitchen. "Go, I'll take care of showing Natalia to her room."

I find myself alone with the bright-eyed innocent who filled my dreams last night. The very forbidden baby sister of the syndicate we need on our side and who have warned me to stay away from the desirable young woman. I inhale a breath, as she stands looking up at me with those blue eyes, perched on her four-inch Louboutins. "Let's go find you a room to get settled into." I head through the great room, leaving her to follow me up the marble stairs to the second story of the home to avoid staring at her ass wrapped in that tight pink skirt.

If I had any sense at all, I would place her at the very opposite wing of mine, but I don't. Instead, I walk right toward my room and open the suite next to mine, telling myself it's for her protection, that having her closer will allow me to keep her safe, when nothing could be farther from the truth. At least not in my dreams, because all I want to do is devour her with my need.

The fact that I'm irresistibly drawn to the forbidden young virgin now in my care only makes her that much more desirable. Which is a problem I'm going to need to fix. Off limits is off limits, end of story. Especially with so much on the line.

When we reach her room, I stand aside so she can go in, watching as she takes in the vast suite that overlooks the east side lawn. She touches the magenta-colored bedspread that covers the queen-sized four poster bed and lays her purse on the floral reading chair with a matching ottoman in the corner.

I gesture to the drapes. "The material is heavy. They keep out the sunlight for obvious reasons. The remote on the nightstand by your bed will open and close them. I'd prefer that you not go out onto the balcony without me. We have security around the perimeter, but best not to tempt anyone with an easy target. Remember, the menaces of the underworld do not play by the same rules as you and your brothers. They can fly and leap, okay?"

Her eyes go wide, and she hugs her slim waist. I glance down at the high heels, short skirt, and blouse she wears. Not that I mind seeing her in that, but if she's going to be hanging out with me, she's going to need some sensible clothes. "Can you have your brothers bring you something else to wear, maybe some hiking boots or at least tennis shoes?"

Natalia's eyebrows arch. "Why?"

I clear my throat. Because that short skirt and the way your nipples peek through that sheer blouse are driving me absolutely crazy does not seem like an appropriate response. "I need to find the rogues. I'm not going to leave you here. I can't protect you if you're not by my side."

Her eyes go wide. "I thought I would just be hanging out here, maybe catch up on some reading or Netflix. You plan to take me traipsing around the world, looking for the same rogues who want to capture me and drink my blood? Have you lost your bloody mind?"

I smirk. "If you put it like that, it wouldn't sound that appealing to me either. How about you think of it this way. Me and the other masters will be out looking for them. If I'm not here, and they come for you, they get past my security, then what? It's safer for you to be with us. Okay?"

She swallows, and I track the motion of her creamy throat, shifting as my dick pushes against the seam of my pants for the umpteenth time since this confounding woman came into my life.

"I'll leave you to settle in. My room is next door if you need anything. I'm going to get changed. Do you want to see if your brothers can have some of your clothes delivered? I'd like to grab something to eat and go out yet tonight. If you haven't heard, we stay out of the sun and sleep during the day."

She grins. "I do know that much about you."

I turn away before she sees my smile, heading to my room to change. I've barely gotten my boots laced when boisterous voices outside catch my attention. Natalia hears it too and comes to her doorway. I gesture for her not to move. "Stay here until I come back for you."

Her face turns white, and her heart begins to pound. My keen ears try to make out the conversation below, but the sudden smell of shifters tells me it's not safe. I transport to the lower level, not caring if Natalia sees me or not. The rules of the vampire masters assimilating into the human world, adapting their behaviors is fine most times, but not when we have rogues to hunt and kill.

Romano, Campania, Sardinia and Botosoni are outside with two mangy shifters. "We caught them outside the gates as we were coming back. They must have been following upwind and thought everyone was in for the night." Campania and Sardinia have each of them zip tied and held in a tight grip. I gesture to the large metal shed at the far side of the property where supplies for the vineyard are kept. "There's space for our visitors there."

I turn to the shifters. "Where is Lucas?" I ask, not expecting an answer this easily, but surprised when one of them speaks. "He's gone psycho. The minute he finds out we've been taken he will have an order put out to kill us, whether we talked or not. We're better off telling you everything and making a deal to save our skin."

It's either our lucky day or a stupid attempt at a trap, but I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth in case what they say is true. "Okay, why don't you give us something of value, and we'll contemplate a deal, but you should know that any negotiations we make will include you being returned to Sheba. What happens to you in the end will be no one's call but his."

The wolves exchange a glance and both nod. Clearly dealing with Sheba, the leader they deserted, is less of a threat than being handed over to a psycho like Lucas who seems to have put a deep-seated fear into these shifters. They both start to talk, but I point to the one who spoke first. "You'll stay with me and tell me what you know."

I turn to Romano and Campania. "Can you take the other to the shed and get whatever information you can from him? Better that they aren't together." They turn to take him away, and Sardinia and Botosoni follow me across the lawn and toward a clearing in the woods, with the shifter in tow. At least here, there is enough cover to keep us out of sight in case others are lurking. I turn to the shifter. "Now, tell us what you know."

He doesn't need to be prodded or given an incentive to divulge the whereabouts of Lucas or whereabouts of the dens the other wolves have used. When we've gotten everything useful from the mangy shifter, I give Sardinia a nod. "Take him to the shed. We can keep him with the others until Sheba can come for them."

Botosoni gestures toward the back of the shifter as Sardinia leads our captive to his temporary home. "You think we can trust what he said?"

I wish there was a better answer. "It's a good question, but the truth is that we won't know until we check it out. Trap or not, it has to be done."

Campania and Romano return with Sardinia after a short wait. "What did the mangy shyster tell you?" I ask, as we make our way back to the house.

"He said that Lucas is hiding out near the base of the mountain, and that the shifters have several dens strategically located around the area to protect him and the rogues."

Botosoni and Sardinia exchange glances with me. "That's exactly what the other one said. So they either contrived the story before we caught them to send us to a trap, or they're telling the truth. Either way, we're not going to know until we go hunting, men," I tell them as we enter my house.

Overmaster Descallia and Lucianna come out from the kitchen with the ladies as we walk in. He gestures me and the masters not so discreetly to the side. "Lucianna could see what happened with the shifters. She told me some of it as it was happening, but did they give you anything concrete that we can trust?"

I inhale, wishing I could be more definitive. "They told us they're all hanging out at the bottom of the mountain base. We separated them to ask the questions, to see if we would get different answers and we didn't, but still, it may be a well thought-out trap. We're not going to know until we go exploring. My gut says we need to go fast before they realize that two of their own didn't return and start wondering if they've spilled their guts."

The masters all nod in agreement. Overmaster Descallia seems more than ready to go but he's not going to like having to take a human along for the hunt, but still she needs to go. "I need to take Natalia," I explain, more for the others benefit than Descallia's since he already knows the situation. "After Lucas came to the club last night, he saw the Benzini brothers talking with Roman. He knows Roman is working with us, unofficially or not. Natalia was threatened by one of the rogues. She's an innocent. You know they're going to try to sacrifice her to make a heated point."

I feel and hear the uniqueness of her heartbeat before she clears her throat. Fuck… I turn and take in the pallor of her skin and can feel the wildly beating heart beneath her chest from here, wishing I could take back the words that just came out of my mouth. Her eyes meet mine dead on. "I guess the sacrificial lamb has no choice but to go hunting with the mighty vampires if I want to keep my blood and virginity intact."

Lucianna smiles gently at the young woman and comes to make her acquaintance, followed by Raven, Willow, Madria and Catina who within minutes have her smiling and feeling much more at home than she was moments ago. "No sign of your brothers or some decent clothes?" I ask, turning my attention back to her. She grimaces, looking at the others who wear jeans and long sleeve t-shirts under their jackets, observing them as they tuck weapons into their dual chest vests. She watches the ladies with their jewel-tipped daggers. "Anyone have clothes I can borrow?"

The ladies laugh. Raven flips her head and waves a wand that magically appears in her outstretched hand. In a blink of an eye, Natalia looks down, suddenly dressed in hiking boots, jeans, and a tight-fitting Henley with buttons that leave just a little too much cleavage exposed, drawing my attention to the creamy swell beneath her shirt. Raven grins. "That's how we roll around here."

Natalia grins back at Raven, but she feels my eyes on her. The slow coloring of her cheeks tells me everything I need to know. Natalia is as conscience of me as I am of her, this attraction, whether we want to admit it or not, whether forbidden by her brothers or my position as her protector is not something that's going to go away. Touching Natalia could expand the war from vampire to vampire to us with the Benzini brothers as well. I drag my eyes away from the tempting little enchantress, because that's what I should do, yet the heat of her gaze draws them back like a temptress in the night.